Department of the Interior OCIO Enterprise Architecture

Created Actionable Enterprise Architecture Program that transformed EA at DOI

The Organization: Department of the Interior

The DOI is a surprisingly complex agency. From a budget point of view, it is not even in the Top 10 in dollars spent. It almost has as many diverse business functions as the Department of Defense. It has a moniker of the Department of Everything else. Land Management for 1 of every 5 U.S. Acres, National Parks Services, Fisheries and Refuge Management, Species Science and Protection, Energy and Mineral Permitting on and off shore, Earth Science, National Mapping, Mining Land Reclamation, Native American Citizen Services, Insular Affairs, Water Reclamation and Energy Production, Geology, Earth Monitoring, and more.

The Problem and Solution: Stand-up and Create a a leading EA Program

With more than 75,000 employees, over 15,000 field locations, the diversity in mission creates for very stovepiped investment in information and technology. So much so, in 2003 OMB Passback language, a major cut in IT spending occurred, specifically citing, get a hold of the IT investment using tools such as EA. At that time, in 2003, under a TRW/Northrop Grumman BPA, Xentity staff began supporting from 2003-2008 the creation of the EA program.

From 2002—2007, under Northrop-Grumman and later under Phase One Consulting Group from 2008 and on, Xentity staff were key enterprise, segment, and solution architect subcontractor. During this period, The Department of the Interior Enterprise Architecture (IEA) Program was recognized as a best practice in enterprise and segment architecture within both public and private sectors. DOI sought Xentity to continue as subcontractor on its highly successful support of geospatial blueprinting and architecture activities. Xentity supported all layers of the architecture (i.e., performance, business, data, applications, service, and technology architectures) for Geospatial business areas and sub-functions. Support services will cover definition of all architectural phases including as-is, target and the associated transition plan, architecture, and communications. Solutions included:

Mapping the Systems, Investments, Security Boundaries to the References Models, Privacy, CPIC, and Security Metadata to support analysis, reporting, and legal responses

Developed and revised a Methodology for Business Transformation that aligned executive goals, project planning, EA analysis and work products concepts, leveraged EA repository, and integrated with annual budget formulation and CPIC cycles.

Executed over 13 Segment based blueprints using MBT including Financial, HR, Law Enforcement, Recreation, Wildland Fire Management, Indian Trust and more.

The Outcomes: DOI set the standard for Federal EA Programs

Through solid customer leadership executing these approaches and partnering with Xentity and, DOI experienced the following:

DOI was recognized as a federal leader in enterprise architecture and performed dozens of knowledge exchange with other agencies and countries

Received the ‘Excellence in Enterprise Architecture’ award by the E-Gov Institute in September 2004 and September 2006

Attained the highest score in the Federal Government for EA maturity by OMB in June 2005 and again in February 2006

Ranked by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) as highest among federal agencies with regards to elements completed (97%) on GAO EA Maturity Framework.

Development of modernization blueprints for key Interior lines of businesses which define a roadmap for minimizing redundant systems, enhancing data sharing, and incorporating proven state-of-the-art technologies while reducing costs and improving services to the end citizen and Interior’s business partners.

DOI’s EA metadata repository effort became a best practice that Xentity supported the information sharing and training to over 200 practitioners and managers and was put into practice in multiple agencies and other countries.